For Whom The Bell Tolls

"No. Afterwards we will be as one animal of the forest and be so close that neither one can tell that one of us is one and not the other. Can you not feel my heart be your heart?"

"Yes. There is no difference."

"Now, feel. I am thee and thou art me and all of one is the other. And I love thee, oh, I love thee so. Are you not truly one? Canst thou not feel it?"

"Yes," he said. "It is true."

"And feel now. Thou hast no heart but mine."

"Nor any other legs, nor feet, nor of the body."

"But we are different," she said. "I would have us exactly the same."

"You do not mean that."

"Yes I do. I do. That is a thing I had to tell thee."

"You do not mean that."

"Perhaps I do not," she said speaking softly with her lips against his shoulder. "But I wished to say it. Since we are different I am glad that thou art Roberto and I Maria. But if thou should ever wish to change I would be glad to change. I would be thee because I love thee so."

"I do not wish to change. It is better to be one and each one to be the one he is."

"But we will be one now and there will never be a separate one." Then she said, "I will be thee when thou are not there. Oh, I love thee so and I must care well for thee."

"Maria."

"Yes."

"Maria."

"Yes."

"Maria."

"Oh, yes. Please."

"Art thou not cold?"

"Oh, no. Pull the robe over thy shoulders."

"Maria."

"I cannot speak."

"Oh, Maria. Maria. Maria."

Then afterwards, close, with the night cold outside, in the long warmth of the robe, her head touching his cheek, she lay quiet and happy against him and then said softly, "And thou?"

"Como tu," he said.

"Yes," she said. "But it was not as this afternoon."

"No."

"But I loved it more. One does not need to die."

"Ojala no," he said. "I hope not."

"I did not mean that."

"I know. I know what thou meanest. We mean the same."

"Then why did you say that instead of what I meant?"

"With a man there is a difference."

"Then I am glad that we are different."

"And so am I," he said. "But I understood about the dying. I only spoke thus, as a man, from habit. I feel the same as thee."

"However thou art and however thou speakest is how I would have thee be."

"And I love thee and I love thy name, Maria."

"It is a common name."

"No," he said. "It is not common."

"Now should we sleep?" she said. "I could sleep easily."

"Let us sleep," he said, and he felt the long light body, warm against him, comforting against him, abolishing loneliness against him, magically, by a simple touching of flanks, of shoulders and of feet, making an alliance against death with him, and he said, "Sleep well, little long rabbit."

She said, "I am asleep already."

"I am going to sleep," he said. "Sleep well, beloved." Then he was asleep and happy as he slept.

But in the night he woke and held her tight as though she were all of life and it was being taken from him. He held her feeling she was all of life there was and it was true. But she was sleeping well and soundly and she did not wake. So he rolled away onto his side and pulled the robe over her head and kissed her once on her neck under the robe and then pulled the pistol lanyard up and put the pistol by his side where he could reach it handily and then he lay there in the night thinking.

21

A warm wind came with daylight and he could hear the snow melting in the trees and the heavy sound of its falling. It was a late spring morning. He knew with the first breath he drew that the snow had been only a freak storm in the mountains and it would be gone by noon. Then he heard a horse coming, the hoofs balled with the wet snow thumping dully as the horseman trotted. He heard the noise of a carbine scabbard slapping loosely and the creak of leather.

"Maria," he said, and shook the girl's shoulder to waken her. "Keep thyself under the robe," and he buttoned his shirt with one hand and held the automatic pistol in the othet loosening the safety catch with his thumb. He saw the girl's cropped head disappear with a jerk under the robe and then he saw the horseman coming through the trees. He crouched now in the robe and holding the pistol in both hands aimed it at the man as he rode toward him. He had never seen this man before.

The horseman was almost opposite him now. He was riding a big gray gelding and he wore a khaki beret, a blanket cape like a poncho, and heavy black boots. From the scabbard on the right of his saddle projected the stock and the long oblong clip of a short automatic rifle. He had a young, hard face and at this moment he saw Robert Jordan.

He reached his hand down toward the scabbard and as he swung low, turning and jerking at the scabbard, Robert Jordan saw the scarlet of the formalized device he wore on the left breast of his khaki blanket cape.

Aiming at the center of his chest, a little lower than the device, Robert Jordan fired.

The pistol roared in the snowy woods.